Recloaking a harbourside treasure

In a gully surrounded by steep grassy slopes above Purau, almost out of sight, is an ancient remnant of Lyttelton Harbour’s native bush.

The trees are up to 1000 years old. They would have witnessed the moa hunters chasing their prey, and local Ma¯ori and European settlers traversing the valley on their way to Port Levy and Akaroa beyond. They would have seen land cleared by fire, Canterbury’s first European farm and first reported armed robbery, and the loss of surrounding bush and birdlife.

But the days of burning bush, grazing sheep and cattle, and planting introduced species on that piece of land are over.

With an eye to returning its ecology to what it once was, a group of 20 citizens has bought the 72-hectare block between the Purau settlement and Mt Evans, naming it Hidden Valley. After jointly committing almost $475,000 for the purchase, they are now committing their time and sweat to restoring the natural habitat of the land.

The group has formed the Hidden Valley Conservation Trust, and had the block covenanted for posterity under the QEII National Trust. Its aim is to conserve, reforest and manage the land while preserving wa¯hi tapu (sacred) and other historical sites.

‘‘We are taking all the steps necessary for nature to reclothe and recloak that land,’’ says trustee Paul Dahl.

He says that while, with the existing trees and shrubs, the land ‘‘looks like an Aussie cricketer’s hair transplant’’, eventually it will be fully reforested, the water pristine, and the native insects, fish and birds will return without the threat of being preyed on by carnivores.

The land is closed to the public, but the trust hopes to be able to open it up for passive recreation within a few years. Already, some walking groups have come through by arrangement.

Dahl said the possibility of future development prompted a group of them to negotiate to buy the land when it became available. The block had been used for grazing, but the soil means it would make ‘‘rubbish’’ farmland, he says.

‘‘We schemed together to buy it,’’ says Dahl, who with wife Andrea Dahl, also a trustee, helps maintain Hidden Valley alongside their own property next door, known as Manaaki Mai. There was no shortage of people wanting to help buy the land.

‘‘There was a possibility of subdivision, and that would have been a threat to the stream and the bush. We got it all together quite quickly,‘‘ says Dahl.

The landscape features spectacular cliffs and gullies, and the quiet Waituturi Stream, also known as Purau Stream.

Dahl, a former Department of Conservation (DOC) and Environment Canterbury (ECan) staffer, says public involvement is the key to restoring the land around the harbour.

‘‘DOC don’t have the money to buy the land. Individuals are doing it and groups are doing it.’’

He says they are ‘‘cobbling together’’ their own reserves, and their mahi, and hold regular management meetings to discuss what needs to be done.

Paul Dahl says they are not averse to farming in the right place, and local farmers seem to accept what the trust is doing.

‘‘We’ve gone from being ‘bloody greenies’. Now they like us because we’ve put up fences and do pest control. It helps everyone.

‘‘Conservation is infectious’’.

Working together

The trust is just one of several private groups conserving land in the Lyttelton Harbour catchment.

In 2021 the Rod Donald Trust, with the help of Stuff and crowdfunding, purchased Te Ahu Pa¯tiki, 500 hectares of hillside above Charteris Bay and including the two highest peaks on the peninsula, Mt Herbert and Mt Bradley.

On the opposite side of the harbour, in the bay near their marae at Ra¯paki, Nga¯ti Wheke are planting native trees and removing pests as they work to restore its habitat and boost their mahinga kai, or traditional food sources of birds, fish and plants.

Planting and conservation work is also being done at Living Springs at Allandale, at the head of the harbour.

Andrea Dahl says those who helped buy Hidden Valley cover a wide range of people including academics and scientists, and their enthusiasm for conservation is infectious.

‘‘They are incredible. Once a month they turn up and we have a working bee, weeding and fencing and trapping.’’

Among the regular jobs are monitoring species, fencing rare plants for protection, containing gorse, removing plant and animal pests, and developing walking tracks.

Help also comes in the form of Conservation Volunteers, an organisation which co-ordinates volunteers who get out and work on conservation sites around the country.

As well as Hidden Valley’s remnant native trees – which include to¯tara, kanuka, mataı¯, kowhai and lace bark – other important native plant and animal species have been found in the valley’s spectacular bluffs and gullies.

At least 100 plants and fungi have been identified so far, such as the only known remaining Lyttelton forget-me-not flower. Native animal species include fish and invertebrates. Birds include kereru¯ (wood pigeon), rifleman, grey warbler, and pı¯wakawaka (fantail).

Pests controlled on the land with trapping and shooting include possums, rates, stoats, rabbits, hedgehogs, deer, and goats. Sheep had grazed the land before the trust bought it.

While the humans are busy on the land, they are not the only ones helping regenerate the bush. As predator numbers diminish and bird numbers increase, bird species, especially kereru¯, are spreading the seed from the juicy berries of the native plants.

Raising cash

A project such as Hidden Valley needs more than just goodwill and sweat. It needs cash to meet the costs of the conservation work.

Making money off the land is not the aim of the trust, but it needs income to offset costs and to help pay for traps and fencing materials.

One small source of cash is expected to be carbon credits, and the trust is registering for the Government’s emissions trading scheme.

The trustees are keen to give credit to public organisations for their funding help.

They have been awarded a grant from the Christchurch City Council’s biodiversity fund for weed and pest control, and received money from ECan’s three-year Waitaha Action to Impact fund for items such as fencing.

Practical help is coming from working with groups including Trapping Monitoring NZ, which tallies the numbers of pests trapped, and iNaturalist, an online community of naturalists who spot and identify species of interest.

The trust’s deed says it also wants to honour the history of the land. It was long used by preEuropean Ma¯ori as a hunting ground and a travelling route.

Artefacts found in the Purau area from the days of early Ma¯ori

occupation include

pounamu and stone adzes, necklaces, and the contents of moa ovens.

Paul Dahl says while the trust has bought and is managing the block, none of the owners feel its pre-European history belongs to them.

‘‘It belongs to Ma¯ori. It’s their land, and we’re just looking after it.’’

The Hidden Valley name could be temporary as they hope Nga¯ti Wheke will at some stage gift a new name, he says.

There are plenty of tales from the days of 19th century European occupation of the land, which was the site of the area’s first European farm from the early 1840s. Early owners included the Greenwood, Rhodes and Gardiner families.

The Greenwood farmhouse became the site of Canterbury’s first known armed robbery in 1846 when the Blue Cap gang arrived with pistols, looted the house of all they could carry, and got away

with their plunder by boat. The gang was later caught.

For many years, even after European settlement, the road up the valley was a popular route for travellers heading to Little River and Akaroa. At one stage the local farmhouse became a pub for locals and passersby.

Local newspapers record the conservation voice was present at Purau even before the end of the 19th century.

In The Press on Arbour Day 1892, a letter to the editor lamented the loss of native trees on the ‘‘lovely bush land at Purau’’ and the work done by ‘‘the fire stick’’. A few years later a writer to the Lyttelton Times said: ‘‘I can imagine fewer things of more value from a recreative point of view for the citizens of Christchurch than Purau would have been, had it been conserved as a national park in old days when it was densely bushed…’’

Cleaning up the rivers

A 2021 report by Lincoln University ecologist Kate Marshall into the health of Purau’s Waituturi Stream says while its overall health is good, the quality degrades as it gets lower down the hill.

The stream is one of five permanent rivers running into the harbour.

Already established to help groups improve the waterways in the Lyttelton Harbour basin is Whaka Ora, also known as the Healthy Harbour scheme. It was established jointly by the city council, ECan, the port company, Nga¯ti Wheke, and Nga¯i Tahu.

Whaka Ora’s programme manager, Karen Banwell, says the land at Hidden Valley needs to have trees to hold water in the soil, improving the health of the stream and the water quality of the harbour.

‘‘It is marginal land. It shouldn’t be farmed,’’ she says.

Not daunted by the task they have already taken on, the Hidden Valley trust members want to buy more land to boost the size of their protected block.

They hope to buy an adjoining 40 hectares, which would give them the whole catchment of the Waituturi Stream. Contributors have already indicated they are keen to put more money in, while others have indicated a willingness to join the group.

Within a few years, the land could be a popular recreation spot for walkers and nature lovers and part of a network of Banks Peninsula tracks, says Dahl.

He says while the project is long-term, they and others regenerating land around the harbour are already seeing the results of their labours.

‘‘We will have the peninsula greened up in our lifetime. It is doable.’’

‘‘We are taking all the steps necessary for nature to reclothe and recloak that land.’’

Paul Dahl